Formosa Neijia

I came across a very interesting thread on the KungFu Magazine Forum that I’d like to share with you. A successful teacher had decided that he was finacially secure enough that he would answer any questions that people had about opening and operating a CMA school. Obviously, people who have made it themselves and then are willing to share information that they picked up along with others, especially for free, are really, really rare.

The thread is here.

Several things about this man and the info he shared struck me. One, was that he felt you didn’t have to sacrifice quality of training in order to run a successful school. From what he said, he didn’t seem interested in running McDojos. He seemed interested in adhering to standards of training rather than just handing out forms.

Second, he said what made a school professional was its ability to have a well-designed and taught curriculum, and the service that the school provided. By service he meant: starting classes on time, keeping the school clean, looking professional, keeping supplies that are sold in stock, etc. How much customer service have you ever seen at a CMA school? The very thought of it made my jaw drop.

His comment about a well-thoughtout curriculum also made an impression. I’ve been to far too many classes in which what was taught was whatever the teacher thought of in the car on the way to practice. This is standard operationg procedure here in Taiwan. I know two teachers here that have a well-designed curriculum like this guy is suggesting and both of them are professional CMA teachers and, yes, they are making it financially.

The final thing that struck me about the thread was his absolute stand on the necessity of contracts. He firmly believes that students must sign contracts so the school owner will know precisely how much income he will have to pay expenses every month. That was a really hotly debated point on the thread. Many, many people disagreed. His point was that in a capitalistic society, the student-teacher relationship is NOT enough to ensure that the student will stay in class.

I have noticed this so many times. Students always complain about not wanting contracts, they want the freedom to come and go, they want nice clean facilities, etc. But what is a teacher supposed to do? If students don’t have contracts or pay in advance, then teachers are the ones left holding the bag when the student decides to leave with no notice given to the teacher. Basically, counting on the student-teacher relationship to keep the student coming back to class worked in feudal China. Afterall, everyone lived in the village, no one moved away, and everyone knew each other and what they were doing. Modern capitalist societies are different.

Two of my teachers have us pay in advance. One has us pay by each 3-month class. The other has us pay for 13 lessons up front. These pay schemes aren’t exactly contracts but they do provide some measure of security for the teacher.

I advise anyone that is thinking of opening or that attends a MA school to read the thread above very carefully and think about what this teacher said. We all could learn a lot from him.